in my time of dying
by sanumarox123
Summary: 'Rick pulls Kate against him with shaking hands. The living dead see them as nothing more than flesh and meat and that is what they have become; there are no pretenses here.' Zombie AU.


When the dead rise, no one really believes it.

Not even when they see the armies of zombies stumbling around, populating the survivors and taking everything they once knew was life away.

(When they watch a walker snarl and grab a random man on the street, biting and biting and _biting_, only then does the truth sink in. It's the start of a zombie apocalypse, and the end of the world is near.)

They try to stick together at first. Castle, Beckett, Martha, Alexis, Javi, Jenny, Ryan: they find each other first, as they always do, as they have always done. They run to the The Old Haunt and hope for survival.

Espo goes first. He leaves that first morning to try to find others- they think he's the best bet to fight back- but he doesn't come back. Lanie is inconsolable. Kate holds her friend's fragile body, suddenly so small, in her arms, rocking Lanie as she sobs with her over the loss of a friend, a loved one.

There is silence in the town for four days. And then they come again, swarming the place. Lanie is the one bashing the door down, her fists smashing glass and wood as if she can't even feel it anymore. They try to flee out the back door, but there are a couple walkers waiting there too-Montgomery, Gina; two of the first.

By the time they make it to the loft, there are only Castle, Beckett, Jenny, Martha and Alexis. Most of New York has been caught: there are only a couple dozen people waiting on the streets. Ryan had snuck off on the way to find supplies, and when Jenny finds out what happened to her husband as he approaches her at the once lobby of Castle's apartment, she gives herself up.

It's selfish, Kate thinks. Not to die for the sake of another, no, but to leave others behind who need you too.

* * *

"I wonder if there's anyone left in New York," Kate says, gazing out a window into the cold morning light. (Is it winter, spring? She forgets what month it is, all she knows is that it's the thirtieth day.) She knows the answer but she asks the question anyway. She's thinking about her dad; she's hoping he survived somehow.

"You mean Zombieville," says Rick.

Before Kate can stop herself, a laugh bubbles up. Then she reaches out; her hand finds his almost as if by accident.

He holds tight to her.

(He does not let go.)

* * *

On the forty-fifth day, they kiss for the second time (the first happened so long ago, they count this as their first). It's not an accident; it's not settling for what is left.

It's careful and meticulous and they touch each other like their bodies might break apart at any moment.

They are the last people in the city and for once Kate isn't thinking about everyone they've lost.

For once they are thinking only of each other.

Rick holds her the same way he's been holding a gun: as a weapon, as hope, as something that is too strong to break and too weak to survive this. (That's the one thing that hasn't changed since all of this began; even before, he treated her like she was the most precious thing in the world.)

When Kate runs her finger along his bottom lip, he shivers.

"You're not a replacement for anyone," he says. "I'm not a replacement for anyone."

"No," she says, and she kisses him again, hungry for _him_.

* * *

On the sixtieth day, his daughter gives herself up to the zombies, surrendering to the horror outside.

Rick pulls Kate against him with shaking hands. They cry together. The living dead see them as nothing more than flesh and meat and that is what they have become; there are no pretenses here.

They sleep together that night in his bed. If Kate still cared to mull over the madness of the world she might have found something weird about it-but all she cares about is Rick's warm, big hands and his strong (and beating) heart. She sleeps with her head on his chest, her fingers curled in a fist over the place where his heart is, and for the first time since the end of the world began she doesn't dream about the people they've lost or the walkers stumbling outside the building.

* * *

The army that saves them reaches the ruins of NYC on the seventieth day.

It's safe to exit the loft again.

But they don't leave at first. They're scared. This little quiet safe haven they've created away from everything else - what happens when they step into the blaring sunlight (how can it be _sunny _right now?) and see the ruins of the everything that was once theirs?

The army took the corpses of their friends and family, along with several hundreds, thousands, of others, to be 'cremated' somewhere far away. (Kate knows that's nice talk for mass graves, because even if the armies saved them, in the long run, those men and women could care less about the dead.)

When Kate and Rick watch the trucks leave slowly out to the ruined roads, it sinks in for the first time: the zombies are dead and _they have survived._

Kate could leave without him, but she will not do that to him again; she is done with loss.

She will do anything that she needs to to keep him by her side.

* * *

They leave the ruins of their city on the seventy-eighth day. There is nothing left for them there.

They will become new people, with new lives.

* * *

**I'm sorry. I was ranting to Alex (castlefanfics tumblr) last night about The Walking Dead, then I stumbled upon bravevulnerability's _In The End_, and while I was watching the Season 2 finale of The Walking Dead, I was also typing furiously because I _couldn't get this out of my head._**

**Whoops.**

* * *

**_happy new year everyone, and i hope you all had a great 2014! HERE'S TO A GREAT 2015._**


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